Survivors
by Strength of Spirit
Summary: Laurie has a dream. To see the world, alive and whole. One little problem. It's overrun by wraiths, Mother Nature's punishment for destroying the body of the Earth. But where there's a will, there's a way. With her friends, Laurie's going to find a way, or die trying. Because she's determined to bring the life of the Earth back to the world.
1. Chapter 1

**This is a story I'm writing for fun, I own, please don't copy it. **

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Chapter 1

Hope

Laurie

From my side I heard my mother's scream, shrill and scared. "Daniel!" I jolted forward to see what had happened to my dad. Then I froze. He was by a huge ragged hole in the walls of our home, a cave under ground, slashing at dark patches of swirling mist,attempting to hold off a wraith with my brothers. The wraiths had gotten in! Mom was curled up behind a chunk of rock crying. Dad was in front of the twins, who were shouting and yelling as loud as they could at the spirits to no avail. As I watched in horror, a wraith got through the doorway, and glided toward my mom. She was frozen in terror, unable to move, like me. That somehow forced me into action. I rushed forward to help, but my father got there before me, and forced the wraith back down the tunnel. Just before he could force them outside, as if in slow motion, a strand of the wraith's dark existence touched my father, and just as his mind and body left, he hit the walls of the tunnel with all his might, and with a deafening ROAR of rocks crashing down, dirt crumbling, our cave sealed itself off to the outside world. As everyone cleared the dust out of their eyes after what seemed to be an eternity, all I could hear was my mother, sobbing. I screamed, at the wraiths, at the world,"Dad!"

''Laura! Laura! Wake up!'' I rolled over on my cot.

"No, DAD!" I cried.

"Laurie! Laurie!" The voice called in my ear, this time a little bit louder.

I suddenly sat up. "What? where's dad?"

Blinking the sleep from my eyes, I deflated a little. Even after six years, the moment when dad became one of them still was crystal clear. I sat up, and began to cry on gran's shoulder.

"Shh, shh" Granny comforted "it's alright, now, dear, crying won't help anything now, will it? I told you this that night, and I'll tell you it again. You need to live for your dad, and for the life he would've had with you. " I dried my tears on my ragged sleeve, and nodded shakily. "You're right, as always." I said. That nightmare had plagued me almost my whole life, yet these past weeks, they've made an extreme comeback, becoming clearer and more frequent.

"Do you know what it would be tonight, if we were on the surface?" Granny asked, changing the mood. I thought back to what Granny had been talking about for the past week.

''The full solar eclipse?'' I asked.

"Yeah," she nodded.

"What's the big deal about the solar eclipse?" I questioned exasperatedly.

"Oh, if only you had seen one, Laurie." She smiled wistfully. "I've only seen one before we went underground, but I'll never forget how the moon rose in the bright sky, and covered the Sun, making it pitch black.

" Granny," I questioned, "what does the Sun look like?" I've heard the description of the sun over a hundred times, but I've never gotten tired of listening to Granny describing it.

" Well child," she began with a wistful voice, her eyes looking far into the distance, 'the sun is, was, a wonderful thing. It brought light to us all and kept us warm. Every morning it climbed over the mountains and rose to the highest point in the sky. It looked like a magic glowing ball of fire. Oh Laura, you would have loved it." Granny said breathlessly. Then she reached under the bed and pulled out a drawing. "This, my child is a picture of the Sun." It was a ball of white, no more. But just looking at the drawing I could imagine what Gran described; warmth, light, day, I made up my mind that I would go see the sun, even if it was the last thing I did. But how? Ten of my friends and family lived in a cave deep under the surface of the earth. Above, wraiths of damned souls howled, paying for the crimes their ancestors committed. Dad was one of them. But us humans were meant for the surface, I knew that, not hiding in a dark, dingy cave from apparitions. Someday, we would have to face our fears, but when we did, I was determined to crush them under my boot. Gran was looking at me, smiling like she knew what I was thinking. "You want to see the trees and the flowers, don't you?" I nodded. "You children are like that. Whenever you have a real dream, you go out and accomplish it. You have a dream right now, don't you? Well, take your dream and make it everyone's. I knew you were special, that you were going to break us free, from the moment you were born. Do you know what your name means? It means laurel. There's a chinese myth, out there, that the laurel tree would repair itself every time it was cut. You're a natural leader, Laurie. Use your talent to the best of your ability. Heal our little group. It's too late for the adults, but it's never too late for children to hope. Do you think so, Laurie?" Granny asked. I smiled. "We can always hope."

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**So, Laurie's got a dream. Will she succeed? Or will she get killed in the process? And how can she get allies to join her?**


	2. Welcome to My World

**Hullo, I'm back here, with another prewritten chapter.**

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Chapter 2

Welcome to my world

That morning, or at least when Gran said it was morning, I sat by my mom, and the twins. As usual, we dug out a handful of mushrooms from our garden, and Castor, one of my annoying brothers, heated them up by the heat vent. Now might be a good time to explain my situation. I live, with my mother and my twin older brothers in a cave very deep in the ground. Why? I'm not sure why. I was born here, my brothers, my friends, we all were Mom was just married when Gran and our group moved underground, together with her friends, and baby Kamau. Whenever I ask Gran why, she answers, just because. Every freaking time. That was not a satisfactory answer. But try as I might, that was all I could get out of her.

Mom says that we live five miles under the surface. She's told me that a mile is about twenty times the length of our cavern, which I can't imagine. To me, it's the hugest place I've known. Gran says there's more, much more to the world, with mountains hundreds of times the size of my home. I don't believe her. There can be nothing imaginable larger than this. But all the adults insist. On New Year's, we sit around the fire, and listen to the tales they tell us if the upper world. It's the only time we ever hear about it, when they intentionally tell us. But anyway. Five miles. It must be so open, so far to run, more land than you could ever touch in several lifetimes.

Five miles to the surface. We live here, ten of us. Kamau, the oldest child and the only one that's ever been on the surface, his parents, they all had dark skin, black hair, and light blue eyes. The my other two friends, Evera and Aydan, were fair skinned. Ayden had corkscrewing red hair, and Evera had pin straight white hair. Gran said my three friends were very unique in their appearance, but, I've nothing to compare them to. I know that they're special to me, that's all. My brothers. Hmm. How does one describe them? They're worst enemies, best friends, exactly the same, and polar opposites. They fight, all the time, but they know the other so well, they could switch places and Mom wouldn't notice. The two look identical, from the black hair and pale skin right down to the funny birthmarks the two have on their forearms, that I have as well. The only way I can tell Castor and Pollux apart is that Castor leaves small curl of hair on the back of his neck, which Mom assigned him the day he learned to talk, he told me, so everyone else could identify him from his twin. But there's no way to mix them up if you know them, unless, of course, it's be Castor or be Pollux day, when there's no possible way to tell them apart. Pollux is the son every mother wants, studious, obedient, friendly, helpful. Castor is, well, completely the opposite. He loves trouble, not learning, and pranking, amongst other things. But they're the perfect match when they want to be. Pollux encourages Castor to slow down, while Castor makes Pollux open up and have fun. My brothers are possibly the best paired siblings ever made. Mom, well, she's just a mother. Overprotective, caring, loving, but not that fun. Ever since my dad turned, it's like she's a shell of her old self. But I still love my mother with all my heart. Gran is my favorite family member. She's my father's mother, but she's always there for my mom. If you ever need to make the right decision, she would be the one to talk to. She's like the center of life in our group, and everyone listens to her. Gran, even though she's nearly a hundred years old, is full of laughter, like a child. My grandmother is what keeps the group together. And me? Well, I'm thirteen, the youngest child. I'm kind of awkward, kind of blunt, kind of nerdy. At least, that's what everyone else tells me. My family, (yes, even though we're not blood related, everyone's family,)we live in a tiny cave underground. The adults may complain that it's dingy, or crowded, but to the six of us kids, it's the only home we've ever known. The thing about living in such close quarters with others for such a long time, is that you get to know them. Very well. There are no grudges to be held, because if you see them every morning, it takes a very short time for the matter to be resolved. We all are very close, and even though everyone has a favorite, (hey, that happens in blood related families, too,) ten of us, love and respect each other, as gran says, more than a normal family does. The hollow may be dingy, may be cramped, but it's home. And here is where my heart lies. So, that's my family. Be warned.

So anyway, the twin terrors are cooking while I'm listening to the sound of the rest of our group tumbling through the lair. Kamau enters from a door to my left, and immediately goes for the steaming plate on the table. Boys. "'Yo Laurie." someone shouted from the other side of the room. I looked up and replied

" Good morning, Kamau." Kamau was a baby when Gran and the adults moved underground, so he's the only child that's ever been on the surface. He claims he can't remember a thing, though, which is really sad, because our friend wouldn't be so close-mouthed about the surface as the adults are. Kamau sat down on his seat, next to Castor, his best friend, who by now had set a heap of mushrooms next to him. Fungi and few herbs that grow without light are usually all we get to eat. The kids never complain about it, but the adults do, which Gran tells me is hilarious. I think that Gran has a very odd sense of humor. But she says normally, kids are the ones complaining. By now, the rest of my family has entered the room, and are bustling around with our self made clay plates. Another thing about us. Since we're the only surviving humans on earth, there's no such thing as store bought. Gran finds that funny, too. Pollux sits next to me, like usual, and digs into his meal with gusto. Evera, the only other girl, and my best friend, sits down on my other side. She's kind of timid, and looks a little bit like a white mouse. Gran rolls into the room in her wheelchair, and we all begin to eat. When I asked Mom once, why the grown-ups didn't like to eat the food, she told me that because it was the only food we ever got, the kids ate it willingly. We didn't know any better. The adults, they had seen better. Then she'd smiled and told me,"Can't miss what you don't know."

Castor and Pollux are talking about some lava burst that went past their room last night with Kamau. They were finishing each other's sentences and waving their hands wildly, trying to describe the rush of molten rock. "It was the biggest I've ever heard! Like whoosh! And it lasted for nearly half an hour!" one of them shouted. They found the scariest things cool, I didn't. When I was little and was allowed to pick my room, I picked the one farthest away from the lava vent. It was the only thing I was afraid of. "Laurie?" Evera asked in her quiet voice. "Huh?" I jolted out of my reverie. She laughed, in her pretty, delicate way. "You were drifting off a little bit." "Oh sorry." Then a thought occurred to me, about the conversation Gran and I had last night. "Do you ever think about the surface?" Evera looked at me like I was crazy. "What?!" Everyone stopped their conversations to stare at us. We blushed. "Nothing's up." I told them sheepishly. " The surface?" Evera asked me." Your mom says it's dark, and really dangerous." Oh, so my mom talks to her, but not me. I'm indignant for a second, but, I guess it was to be expected. Mom and Evera have very similar personalities. "It's not, really. Well, maybe it is now. But Gran says before, it was beautiful! With an amazing thing called the Sun, that keeps them warm and makes skies bright. Wouldn't that be so cool to see?" Evera looked dubious. "I guess it would be kind of cool, but what about all the wraiths up there?" I stopped, about to start up on a rant. I'd never thought about that. The wraiths, and my dad who was one of them, lived up there. All the more reason to go, so I could try and get my dad back. But Evera wouldn't see it that way. I realized, this wasn't going to be easy. " Evera, what about all the animals and the plants and the sky?" "They don't exist anymore," She replied flatly. And I was stuck. I'd never really thought this through, I realized. What was I going to fight for? "Yeah, you're right," I muttered. Evera nodded, and continued to eat in her customary silence. Maybe I would have to think this through very carefully with Gran.

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**Hope you liked it, and as always, don't steal if you value your reputation in the court. No offense.**


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